Muralist Koryu Aoshima was commissioned by the South Dunedin Street Art Trail to return to the mostly black-and-white mural of a dragon in King Edward St and add a splash of colour.
Mr Aoshima painted the dragon as a part of the South Dunedin Street Festival in March in front of a live audience.
This month he has spent most of his sunny afternoons adding a kingfisher, lotus flowers and a portrait of a Chinese woman playing a flute to it with a blue background.
He said he found coming back to the mural challenging but he was keen to add the new Chinese elements to its story.
In Chinese mythology the dragon lived in a river and had a lot of natural power, Mr Aoshima said.
In updating the mural, he kept with the theme of a river.
The king fisher was a river bird and lotus flowers could be found floating in rivers in China.
He would chip away at the mural from about noon to 5pm whenever the weather permitted and it would be complete this month, Mr Aoshima said.
He was painting it at a slow pace because he enjoyed interacting with pedestrians when they would stop to have a chat, Mr Aoshima said.
As a freelance artist he appreciated the support of the Art Trail and Naylor Love in helping him paint the mural.